It is ordered on Super Swift today and should be validated next weekend. This will allow us to order the full quantity PCB panels in August 13th. Assembly is estimated to be 10 business days from the day when all components and PCBs are received.

Building things that fly is hard. The constraints on small, battery powered, radio-operated gear already presents a challenge, but adding weight, balance, and aerodynamic constraints takes it to a whole new level. Sophi Kravitz rises to the occasion and discusses each challenge of building a blimp from start to finish in her presentation at the 2018 Hackaday Belgrade conference.

One of the pleasures of writing for Hackaday comes through the incredible array of talent and experience to be found among our colleagues. We all do our own work, but one is humbled by that which flows from the benches of those one works alongside. Just such a project is the Remote Control Mini Blimp from our colleague Sophi Kravitz. It’s a game involving an obstacle course and a set of remote-controlled blimps. The challenges in such an endeavour have been pushing the limits of what is possible with off-the-shelf components.

So after a series of versions, she had a PCB with left and right motors on two arms and a lift motor pointing downwards, which she suspended beneath the helium bag. Her controllers are simple enough 3D-printed joystick housings, with another ESP8266 within. The blimp ESP8266 forms a wireless network to which the controller connects.

Probably inspired by the successful Bootlin campaign for open source Allwinner VPU drivers, two days ago Maciei Suminski and Tomasz Wlostowski made Youtube video where they apeal for fund rising 30 000 CHF for the development of KiCAD v6! Everyone can show their support for the most successful open source PCB design tool at: https://givetokicad.web.cern.ch

Badge·Life (noun): the art of spending too much time, energy, money, and creativity to design and produce amazing custom electronics and get them into the hands of those who appreciate incredible craftsmanship.

Between the talks, workshops, presentations, demos, and installations at Teardown 2018, there was a lot of intense information to absorb at once. Luckily, we were able to record some of the speakers doing their thing so attendees could reflect back and those who weren’t able to come physically are still able to participate. Videos are embedded in the sessions page. Here are shortcuts to each video:

[Andrzej Laczewski] has something big in mind for small parts, specifically SMD resistors and capacitors. He’s not talking much about that project, but from the prototype 3D-printed bowl feeder he built as part of it, we can guess that it’s going to be a pretty cool automation project.

Bowl feeders are common devices in industrial automation, used to take a big pile of parts like nuts and bolts and present them to a process one at a time, often with some sort of orientation step so that all the parts are the right way around. They accomplish this with a vibratory action through two axes, which [Andrzej] accomplishes with the 3D-printed ABS link arms supporting the bowl.

The DomCo Electronics, Inc. ESP8266 AC Power Switch is everything you need to get started with controlling AC mains from an ESP8266. We know dealing with AC can be intimidating for people at times and we wanted to simplify the process of making your own IoT device.

Everything you need to control a 100-240VAC 50/60Hz load is built right onto the board. Simply solder on a power lead and socket of your choice to the Power Switch and the on-board code can get you up and started in minutes. (We have a USA power tail and socket in the optional extras below.) No more needing to wire up an ESP board, a Wall wart, an IoT Power Relay (Power Tail), and a bunch of wires just to control your light or coffee maker.